Real-time for the First Time

Before the advent of computers, researchers had to sift through data by hand. In 1962, scientist Carl Bowin installed the first computer on a WHOI ship, an IBM “1620” to analyze gravity measurements in real-time inside in a special air conditioned room aboard R/V Chain. It was so expensive Bowin rented it rather than buying it. IBM officials were doubtful the computer would survive at sea, but the machine performed successfully. Bowin said he felt a “thrilling sense of importance” when he saw the computer’s first at-sea printout. By 1969, computers become standard equipment aboard WHOI ships.(Photo courtesy of Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Archives)